CHAPTER XV. EXECUTIONS. CHRISTIAN CONVICTS LED OUT OF PRISON FOR EXECUTION. REPRIEVED.BOOKS PUBLISHED BY BARROW AND GREENWOOD WHILE IN PRISON. THEY AND THEIR ASSISTANTS INDICTED FOR THE SAME, CONVICTED, AND SENTENCED TO IMMEDIATE EXECUTION. A CONFERENCE WITH BARROW AND GREENWOOD " FOR THEIR SOULS' HEALTH" AND FOR THEIR RECANTATION. THE SENTENCE OF THEIR ASSOCIATES COMMUTED.- BARROW AND GREENWOOD TAKEN TO THE GALLOWS. THEIR ADDRESSES TO THE PEOPLE. — A SECOND REPRIEVE. REJOICINGS OF THE PEOPLE. TAKEN AGAIN TO TYBURN AND EXECUTED. — THE SECRET HISTORY OF THEIR REPRIEVES AND EXECUTION. JOHN PENRY AND HIS FAMILY AT STEPNEY. HIS ARREST THERE. HIS HISTORY WHILE IN SCOTLAND. HIS PRIVATE NOTES OF WHAT HE HEARD THERE. - HIS PAPERS SEIZED. HIMSELF IMPRISONED. HIS LETTERS. TO HIS WIFE AND CHILDREN. HIS EXAMINATION. HIS MEMORIAL TO THE GOVERNMENT. HIS DECLARATION AGAINST PROSECUTION FOR HIS BOOKS. — IS INDICTED, CONVICTED, AND SENTENCED TO DEATH FOR PRIVATE WRITINGS. HIS EXECUTION.- ELIZABETHAN JURIES. — PENRY'S STEADFASTNESS. HIS FAREWELL LETTERS TO THE CHURCH, TO HIS WIFE, TO HIS CHILDREN. THE RELATION OF THE QUEEN TO THESE EXE CUTIONS; AND OF THE BISHOPS. 1592-3. ON the 24th of March, 1592-3, a heavy fog mantled the city of London, beneath which the few who were astir crept through cheerless light and chilling air, although the sun full half an hour before had shed a flood of glory over the German Sea. A few shivering creatures were gliding along near Newgate; here a man, there a woman, now a child, half clad in damp and filthy rags, and there a lean and mangy cur,-all grubbing or scenting the gutters for a chance morsel of offal, and all wearing a look of ineffable woe. The very house-walls looked miserable, the fog trickling along their faces and dripping from their eaves. A man in charge of a rude cart and a sorry horse, before the gate of the prison, and wrapped in a heavy overcoat of frieze, -a half-naked lad crouched in the corner of a wall, and gnawing at a bone which he had just won by stout battle from a dog, were the only living things in sight which did not give signs of suffering. Within the prison the morning light was scarce perceptible. A few flambeaux, supported by brackets, shed along the corridor a flickering glare, which was reflected strongly, and to the unfamiliar eye rather unpleasantly, from the steel weapons which studded the walls. On either side were a row of stout halberdiers, in full service dress, under command of a yeoman of the guard, attended by a sheriff's deputy. Soon after this arrangement had been made, the clang of massive doors and rolling bolts was heard from above, and then the heavy tread of men and the rattling of chains along the stairway. The head jailer then appeared, with a few of his servitors, and advanced to the sheriff with five prisoners, who were shivering with cold and in irons. They were then delivered to the sheriff one by one, - Henry Barrow, John Greenwood, Scipio Bellot, Robert Bowle, and Daniel Studley, to be led forth to execution, and were immediately conducted, under guard, through a grated door to the anteroom, where hung a profusion of manacles and fetters, iron collars and chains. A smith now applied himself to the work of unriveting their bands. By their gaunt and furrowed faces and their gray hairs, Mr. Barrow and Mr. Greenwood betrayed “the cruel usage which, at the commandment of the prelates," they had endured "wellnigh six years," 1 "in most miserable and strait imprisonment."2 The others were comparatively hale, having been confined but a short time; and all appeared composed, and even cheerful, with the single exception of Mr. Bellot, who seemed overcome with terror in view of his approaching fate. When at length they were all freed from their irons, they mutely embraced, and were then conducted by their armed escort without the gate, where the cart was in waiting to convey them to the gallows. The driver produced ropes, and was proceeding to bind his living freight to his vehicle, when an officer appeared, and presented a paper to the sheriff, who broke the seal, glanced over the writing, turned to his prisoners, and said, with much respect and evident emotion, "Sirs! by her Majesty's most gracious order you are reprieved!" They were then led back and recommitted to ward. 4 About two years after the last commitment of Mr. Barrow and Mr. Greenwood, i. e. about the year 1590,- their religious opinions had been publicly assailed and misrepresented; particularly by Mr. Gifford, minister at Malden, who, though a Conformist, had been twice suspended and twice imprisoned for his Puritanism.5 They had also been openly 1 Hanbury, I. 48, and Waddington's Papers; Barrow to an "Honorable Lady and Countess of his kindred," April, 1593. VOL. III. 64 2 Hanbury, I. 59. 3 Barrow to the Countess ↑ Brook, II. 40. 5 Ibid., 274, 275. Strype's Ayl defamed from the pulpit, by "sparsed libels," and mayhap "by false report and witness made against them in those conferences"-insidious1- to which we have alluded, and which had been ordered by the prelates. "No trial, all this while, upon any suit or complaint had been granted them; either çivil, that they might know for what cause and by what law they thus suffered," a privilege "not denied the most horrible malefactors and offenders; or ecclesiastical, where freedom might be given them to declare and plead their own cause."2 They had therefore resorted to the only means left for "pleading their own cause," the press. Although denied ink and paper, diligently watched by their keepers, and continually searched upon various pretences, they had contrived stealthily to obtain scant materials for writing from Mrs. Greenwood, from her maid-servant Cicely, and from others who brought them food. Upon scraps of paper thus obtained, they had been able to write replies to the aspersions uttered against them; and, though often rifled of some things which they had written, had sent them forth piecemeal by the same agentscrude and without revision-to be published by a faithful friend in Holland.3 For these books-in which they had indeed written freely against the bishops and the established Church, but which contained "matters merely ecclesiastical"-"the prelates had caused them to be indicted " mer, 109-112. Hanbury, I. 49, 52. 1 Barrow to the Countess 66 upon the Ibid., 52, 53. Egerton Papers," 171, 172 (by the Camden Society, 4to, London, 1840). Wad * Hanbury, I. 52; Barrow to Bur- dington's MS. Strype's Whitgift, leigh. 416. 1 Statute 23 Elizabeth; the indictment setting forth that the said books were seditious, tending to the slander of the queen and State; or, in other words, "tended to cry down the Church of England, and to lessen the queen's prerogative in matters spiritual.” 2 After preliminary examinations, when they unhesitatingly avowed themselves the authors of the books in question, they had been arraigned on the 21st of March, 1592-3.* At the same time were arraigned Scipio Bellot, gentleman; Daniel Studley, girdler; and Robert Bowle, fishmonger, who were indicted under the same Statute for publishing and dispersing the books devised by Barrow and Greenwood.5 More than two years before, Mr. Barrow had expressed the opinion -and the result proved his accuracy that "the Archbishop had destined himself and Mr. Greenwood to death." For this opinion there was a reason. In the case of Udal, (and soon after in the case of Cawdrey,) the secular 1 Barrow to the Countess 2 * Egerton Papers, 166. 3 Ibid., 170-178. Waddington's Penry, 105, 106, compared); Bowle not until March 4th, 1592-3 (Egerton Papers, 173); and Bellot not until just before the trial. (Compare the date of the trial with Waddington's Penry, 121, * Stow, 765. Heylin's Presb., 122.) One Robert Stokes was also Book IX. Sec. 29. 5 Waddington's MS.; AttorneyGeneral Egerton to the Lord Keeper Puckering. Stow, 765. Collier says (VII. 167) that these men were committed with Barrow and Greenwood, in the year 1588. So also says Heylin (Book IX. Sec. 28). But Studley was not arrested until after December 4th, 1592 (Strype's Annals, VII. 134, and apprehended as their accomplice ; but he had been first excommunicated for apostasy, by the church of which Mr. Johnson was pastor. (Egerton Papers, 173-175, 179. Brook, II. 47.) To his apostasy he seems to have been indebted for his escape from prosecution, and perhaps from death. • Waddington's Penry, 251; Barrow to Fisher. |